Purpose: Previous studies have researched how adults and young children perceive spectacle-wearers within their peer group, but no studies have been published about preteens, or tweens. The Tweens’ Attitudes about Peers in Eyeglasses (TAPE) study was conducted to determine how tweens feel about others their age who wear eyeglasses.
Methods: Subjects viewed a presentation of 24 picture pairs and answered eight questions regarding which peer … he or she would rather hang out with, appears smarter/more intelligent, looks better at playing sports, is better looking, looks more shy, looks more honest, and looks more nerdy. The peers in each comparison differed by gender, race, and spectacle wear. Calculations were performed to determine the probabilities and confidence intervals that a subject would chose a particular peer for each question.
Results: Ninety-seven subjects between the ages of 11 and 14 years participated. The average age was 12.7 ±0.9 years, and 39 (40.2%) of the subjects were female. Subjects reported that 86 (88.7%) were of Caucasian descent, and sixteen (16.5%) wore spectacle correction, 14 (14.4%) primarily wore contact lenses for refractive correction, and seventy-one (73.2%) had at least one family member who required refractive correction. The spectacle wearer appeared smarter (0.58, CI = 0.56-0.60), more shy (0.52, CI = 0.51-0.53), more honest (0.56, CI = 0.55-0.58), nicer (0.55, CI = 0.53-0.56) and more nerdy (0.57, CI = 0.55-0.59). The non-spectacle wearer looked slightly better at playing sports (0.48, CI = 0.47-0.49). Overall, females appeared smarter (0.65, CI = 0.62-0.67), more shy (0.71, CI = 0.68-0.73), more honest (0.67, CI = 0.64=0.70), nicer (0.60, CI = 0.57-0.63), and more nerdy (0.67, CI = 0.64-0.69). Males looked better at playing sports (0.81, CI = 0.79-0.84) and were judged as better looking (0.56, CI = 0.53-0.60).
Conclusions: Spectacles may tend to make tweens appear smarter, more shy, more honest, nicer, and more nerdy to their peers. However, tweens do not consider spectacle wear when deciding with whom to hang out and who is better looking.